If you are getting ready for an early season whitetail hunt you should start scouting in mid-August or early September, when you are likely to see deer at food sources in the morning and evening. Does, fawns, and especially bucks, load up on ripening agricultural crops, succulent grasses, forbes (wild flowers) and sedges (grassy type plants that grow in or near water), and berries and mast (fruits and nuts) in late summer. Knowing this I usually begin scouting during the last two weeks of August, and I often see bucks travelling together and sparring. But, you shouldn't expect to regularly see the bucks using the same food sources as the does, because the bucks often stay closer to their bedding areas than do the does. If the bucks visit the same food sources as the does, they usually appear at night, much later than the does. If the bucks use the same food sources as the does, they usually appear at night, showing up much later than the does.
By cruising the back roads mornings and evenings, with a good set of binoculars, you can find out which fields the deer are using. You may even see the bucks arrive and be able to determine the trails they use. If you stay late enough, you may be able to see them go to another food source. Because bucks don't travel very far at this time of year, the bedding area should be within a half-mile of morning and evening food sources; probably closer to a quarter-mile. When you se a buck enter a food source within a half hour of sunset, take particular notice of where it came from, because the bucks core are is somewhere along the buck's back trail, and not to far away.
Patterning Deer
When you see bucks feeding early in the morning, try to stay long enough to see which way they leave. In the morning bucks usually work their way slowly from more open areas to high grass or brushy areas, and finally into heavy brush or woods, where they feed and bed intermittently throughout the day. Once you know the route a deer takes back to its core area, you can set up during hunting season.
A buck's rub route usually winds through several doe-use areas before ending up at a night-time food source. Then it leads through other doe-use areas as the buck travels back toward its core area in early morning, typically before daylight. You should be able to find several rubs along the evening route, and you should find scrapes in the transition zones; near food sources, along field edges and near doe core areas.
Following a buck's rub route back to its core area can be difficult, because in the early morning bucks often travel under cover of darkness in open areas, which means there are fewer trees. I also believe the bucks don't hang around as long in the morning, because they are trying to get back to the security of their core areas before the sun comes up. For these reasons you may not find any rubs or scrapes along the route a buck takes on the way back to its core area in the morning, until the route goes back into wooded areas. Even if you can't find fresh rubs and scrapes you should be able to find the buck trails by the tracks they leave, and by the rubs left from previous years.
Although these trails leading back into the bucks core areas may not be as visible now as they will be later in the year, you should be able to see old rubs and scrapes. Even if the bucks that made the old rubs and scrapes are not still there, other bucks may be using the same trails. These "buck trails" are chosen because they offer the safest route of travel from a secure core area, through adjacent doe-use areas, to night-time food sources, and back to the core areas again.
Fall Buck Movement
In the fall, bucks aren't just going to night-time food sources; they usually travel through all the adjacent doe-use areas they can get to along the way. When you are looking for buck trails, remember that they often parallel the more heavily used doe trails, intersecting doe trails at bottlenecks or near scraping, feeding and core areas.
Bucks also prefer to use their own trails, generally in more protected areas than the trails does use. Buck trails (especially rub-routes) may be travelled by only one buck, once a day, in one direction; therefore the trail shows very little evidence of use. If the trail you are following shows very little use, it may be a buck trail. If you find faint trails lower or higher on ridges than the doe trails, or trails that run through heavy cover or along creek bottoms, sloughs and forested lake shores, these may be buck trails. When you find trails in protected areas, look for large tracks, drag marks, rubs or clumped droppings.
Field Scouting
While you are scouting, you also may find doe-use areas with old rubs and scrapes; take note of where you find them. Once you find these areas, it is a matter of backtracking the rub route to find the buck's core area. A good time to check this out is before the season opens. Even though you may spook the deer, by the time hunting season rolls around, they will have forgotten about your intrusion and will be using their preferred bedding areas again.
If you don't see any deer, check for beds and large droppings or piles of clumped droppings. I usually find these large clumped droppings in buck daytime core areas, in or near scrapes, and near night-time bucks beds. If there are a lot of droppings in the area, with old or new rubs on adjacent trees, it's a good bet you have found a buck's core area.
If you haven't found the buck's rub route, the buck's core area is a good place to start looking for it. With a topographical map or aerial photo to show an overview of likely food sources, roads and bottlenecks, you can make a good guess which way the buck travels and where it ends up. A buck's trail usually leads from a wooded area that it uses during the day, to an open food source where it feeds and looks for does at night, then back buy a different route to it's core area again.
Once you find the bucks core area you usually can find the its trail out of its bedroom and follow it by the infrequent rubs along the trail. If you have access to all the property the buck uses follow the entire route, from the core area, to the food, and back to the core area again. Once you know the buck's rub route you know where to hunt it. But, unless you have seen him regularly, you don't know when to hunt him. If you have time to really observe the rub route rails, you may learn what time the buck uses which trails. Finding the rub route, and knowing when it is used, tells you the right time and place to hunt that buck.
Observing
When you find fresh rubs and scrapes, set up where you can observe the bucks from a location where you won't be detected. I like to sit on a high hill, where I can watch as much territory as possible, or in a treestand away from the bucks trails, but close enough where I can see them. Once you see the buck, you can back track its rub route and look for a spot to set up on it. Or, if you see the buck, in a location where you can hunt it during the day, you can set up right there.
Another way to locate bucks you can't find during the hunting season is to glass feeding areas and for field sign after the rut, or after the hunting season is over. If you have rain or snow in your areas, get out right after it lets up and look for sign. Then you can track the deer right into their core areas and bedding sites. Then you'll know where to hunt them next year.
If you don't have time to watch a trail, you can use a trail timer device to let you know what time deer come through. If you want to know the size of the buck's rack without being there, you can use a trail camera to take pictures whet the deer walk by. If you use a timing device, be sure to get one with multiple timing functions, so you can tell how many deer use the trail and at what time. If you connect a camera to a timing device, the photos can tell you everything you need to know about the deer using the trail.
If you don't use these devices and don't have an opportunity to observe the trails in person, the best strategy is to find the core area and set up as near to it as you possibly can, using different stands for morning and evening hunts, and for varying wind conditions. By get ting close enough to a buck's core area to watch it, but far enough away that you don't alert the buck to your presence, you increase the chances of seeing the buck during daylight hours.
The Setup
Once you've found the buck's core area and travel routes, you can choose the spots to hang stands. Never rely on just one stand site; always choose several different sites so you have choices when the wind isn't right. Hang your stands at least a week before you plan to hunt from them. If you don't have enough stands for all your hunting sites, you can still prepare the sites. Choose the trees you want to use, hang a stand in them to see if everything is right, then cut the shooting lanes so you are ready when it is time to hunt. Don't wait until the day before the hunt to prepare the site, because there is a good chance the deer may figure out something is wrong, especially if you are there when it comes through.
The Dispersal Phase / Fall Home Range Shift
I often hear hunters say they can't find the big bucks they saw earlier, while they were scouting from late August to the entire route, from the core area to the food and back to the core area again. When you find trails, doe-use areas, buck core areas and rub routes, mark them on the map. If you see any deer, record the time, place, weather, food, activity and other factors in a journal.
With the information you gathered in late summer, it takes much less time and effort to locate, observe, record your notes and pattern a deer when it comes to scouting. But you scouting may only help you to locate or hunt the deer from late August to mid to late September. That's because the bucks may not be in the same exact areas from August through mid-September as they are from October through December.
The bucks may have been in bachelor groups in late summer or early fall. But once they shed their velvet, they become more aggressive and eventually don't put up with each other. While some bucks may stay in the area, others move to new core areas, where they don't come in contact with other bucks. Some bucks may move out of a summer home range and go to a fall home range, which may be as far as several miles away. This dispersal usually occurs within two to three weeks of when the older bucks begin to shed velvet. In the upper Midwest, it generally occurs sometime between the first and last week of September.
But by mid-October, these bucks have moved to their fall home ranges. If you plan on hunting after October 15, you should start scouting all over again, because the bucks you saw in late August may have moved to new fall home ranges. Since these bucks usually make new rubs and scrapes, the best way to locate them is to look for fresh rubs and scrapes in areas where they may not have occurred earlier that year.
If you are interested in more whitetail hunting tips, or more whitetail biology and behavior, click on Trinity Mountain Outdoor News and T.R.'s Hunting Tips at www.TRMichels.com. If you have questions about whitetails log on to the T.R.'s Tips message board. To find out when the whitetail rut starts, peaks and ends in your area click on Whitetail Rut Dates Chart.
This article is an excerpt from the Whitetail Addict's Manual ($19.95 + $5.00 S&H), by T.R. Michels, available in the Trinity Mountain Outdoor Products catalog.
T.R. Michels is a nationally recognized game researcher/wildlife behaviorist, outdoor writer and speaker. He is the author of the Whitetail, Elk, Duck & Goose, and Turkey Addict's Manuals. His latest products are the 2003 Revised Edition of the Whitetail Addict's Manual, the 2003 Revised Edition of the Elk Addict's Manual; and the 2003 Revised Edition of the Duck & Goose Addict's Manual. For a catalog of books and other hunting products contact: T.R. Michels, Trinity Mountain Outdoors, PO Box 284, Wanamingo, MN 55983, USA. Phone: 507-824-3296, E-mail: TRMichels@yahoo.com , Web Site: www.TRMichels.com
